Koi ponds anyone?

sheltiemom

The house I live in had a Koi pond when I bought it, that hasn't been in great shape...I'm trying to get it looking good. I spent a ton of money on it this week, a replacement pump, algaecide, and some stuff to help debris decay faster. I also got three aquatic plants to float on the water...I read that these help control algae by feeding off the same things the algae feeds off of, thus smothering it out. I know very little about this pond though, if anyone has any advise, I'd appreciate it....I'm having a problem with algae, leaves in the pond, and with the pump tubing for the waterfall clogging up. Oh, and there's one fish in it right now...I told my kids that once we got it looking good, they could each pick out one more fish. I'll post some pics in a minute, it still looks like crap right now though.

Shaina

How big is your pond? What is is made of (hole in the dirt, plastic lined, etc.)? How strong is your filter? These are the things that will most influence your stocking options as far as how many fish you can have, etc. Overstocking fish will add to the nutrient load, which will make the algae even worse. I honestly don't know what the proper filtration level for a pond would be, as ponds tend to have sump fillters, and I have virtually no experience with those.

The plants might help remove excess nutrients from the water. Where are you located? Depending on your climate, you could try to get a Chinese High-Fin Shark to put in with your Koi since they enjoy vegetation such as algae, though they can be rather pricey I think. Koi can also be pricey, depending on the quality and the age/size of the ones you buy.

This site knows a lot more than I do about koi and koi ponds: http://www.koipondfever.com/

Criosphynx

I need to know these answers too in order to help much...
I loooove chinese high-fin.....

Another word on the plants. You have to fertilize the plants. I know that doesn't sound like it help with the algae, but it will. The plants need other nutrients so they will grow fast enough to beat out the algae. Water hyacinth can be a nusiance, but it grows very fast and you can always throw the extra away. Its a good impossible to kill plant tho.

Any aglae controlling additive tend to not work (i had years and years of customer feedback) If you really want to seriously control it you need a UV sterilizer (about $200) that hooks up to your filter system.

sheltiemom

It is very small unfortunately, had it been me who installed it, I never would have made it so small...it's round, about 3 feet across, lined with a hard plastic insert. I'll check the size of the filter, it's one of the smallest they make, I didn't want to take up too much room in the pond, but it's clogging very quickly. The current fish is no more than 4 inches long...when I moved in there were six fish, but we had an incident...the pest control guy sprayed ant pellets too close to the pond and some blew in, the fish ate them. I thought they all died, but after this winter I saw one was still alive, so now I'm trying to fix it up.

I have read about a uv sterilizer...I spent $200 already this week, so maybe next month on that...everything for the pond is really expensive.

sheltiemom

Here's some pics...this is a before shot, I had already replaced the pump and put in the aquatic plants, but nothing else...



These are after I did some landscaping around it yesterday....







I eventually want to have water flowing down that pile of rocks like a waterfall, but I'm still working on getting it to flow right.

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Noel

i would clean up the pond, and then put in fish, but i guess this fish is kinda like a tester?
but my friend has a pond, and i think she might get an account on here, but i dont know. when i found this site she said it looked cool, so maybe she would be able to help if she gets an account. one way that you will know which user is her, is that she has a jack russell named mollie.

sheltiemom

Yeah, the fish was already in there too, I wouldn't have put any in yet either.

Criosphynx

AWW its soo cute and tiny lol I actually like it.


Don't let people tell you to change all the water.

There is no need to change the water and "clean it" more than once maybe twice a year. Just top it off. The number two problem people have with fish after over feeding is cleaning too often and too much. If the fish is alive and healthy, your water is fine, just green. Putting in new water wont change the green water for more than a week, but it will kill any ecosystem you have.

More plants and less sun, and you'll be ok

Willowy

I've heard that barley hay will reduce algae in ponds. I think they even sell it at Petsmart (though I'm sure you could find it cheaper somewhere else).

You may know this already.....but don't put any actual koi in that pond! It's wayy too small---koi can get to be 3 feet long. Regular comet goldfish would be better, although even they might get too big (up to 14 inches). Maybe fantails would be best.

drfong

Hi. I do not have a pond where I currently live. I have had them in the past and want to put one in my new home. A few things to say.
1. you definately do not want any koi in that pond. It is a really nice water feature for your landscape, but not nearly large enough for Koi.
2. Depending on where you live in GA. fantails may not make it through the winter.
3. You need to figure out how deep it is and if it is deep all the way across or steped on the sides and only deep in the middle. A shallow pond is hard on the fish. Lots of temp changes. Also then you can figure how many gallons it holds to make a judgment about how many fish it will hold. My guess would be don't put more than 3 or 4 comets in it. They should be very happy.
4. If you want the water to flow down the rocks into the pond you need to make sure the water can not go thru them. You need to use plastic under them to keep the water from geting through. Also make the sides taller than the middle so it can not run over the sides. They also sell expandable foam that you can use to seal up between rocks. You can do it in a way you can't see it.
5. as far as the filter pump cloging, I'm not sure what you have. My pump was in a seperate section of the pond. There was neting at the entrance and the filter media surounding the pickup. It seems like you have just a pump in the bottom of your pond. You just need to figure a way to screen the pickup.

Mostly just enjoy it and don't overstock. Here are a few pictures of my pond from my old house. I gave away the koi as they were really too big for my pond and my pond was much larger than your. It had 3 levels and was pretty deep in the middle of the main section.


The pond

Close up of the fish, 4 comets and 2 koi

At night with lights

sheltiemom

Thanks guys, that was very helpful. Drfong, your pond looks great. Mine is deeper than I expected considering the surface area....I took a very scientific measurement and it's just above my elbow . There are rocks at the bottom, but no sloping sides, and the fish that's in there now looks like a common goldfish. The rock waterfall...I have plastic under it, the shape I think is the problem....good idea about screening the filter.

drfong

Thanks, I really miss the house and the pond. But I'm really glad to not be in MS anymore.
Also forgot to mention. If you are looking for a waterfall type effect, you really need to have a resevor that fills with water at the top of the rocks. You could even use a 5 gal bucket and hide it with the rock mound. You also need to have some large rocks (preferbly flat) to use as an edge for the water to fall from. Without that you will just get the look like there was a hose turned on running down some rock. That is fine, just not sure what effect you are looking for.

A few more ideas. If you do not know how long it has been since the pond was completely cleaned, you can do that and that will eliminate the alge you currently have. It doesn't sound like you have any filter media or much else to disturb anyway. It really is good to do it every spring anyway so now is a good time. Use your pump to completely drain the pond. Use the water to water plants, etc. It's great for that. Put the plants and fish in a bucket with some of the old water. Since you don't have a filter box for the pump, etc you may want to use something like panty hose on the filter pick up. Then maybe some pond filter media around that and hold all that together with some more panty hose. I hope that makes sense. You can camoflage the whole thing with some rock at the bottom of the pond. Use a hose and clean rags and wipe down all the surface of the liner and you will be disgusted by all the gunk in the bottom. Scoop it all out and get the thing pretty clean. Fill the pond back up and declorinate it. You can get straight declorinator for ponds that is much cheeper than using stress coat, etc. Put the plants in where you want them. I would leave the fish in the bucket with some old water. Then add some of the new water from the pond. Do it alittle at the time until you have mostly new water in the bucket. Just add a little every 5 min or so. Then just dump the fish in. He'll love his clean home. You can then work to keep things under control rather than clean up a mess to start with. You could easily add 2-3 more comets. I just bought a 24watt UV sterilizer from petsmart for 50 bucks. It has done wonders in my 90 gal fresh water tank. It had green water that was out of control. I think if you start with clean water it would be enough to keep it clear. The box does not say it can/can not be used in a pond, but I think it could be. It is a completely contained submersable unit. You can also find others on ebay that I know would work for less than 100 bucks.

iwantmypup

Sheltiemom and Drfong...those are such cute little ponds! So neat!!

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